NAU’s student athletes are going to have a new home away from home this coming semester, as the university has received approval from the city of Flagstaff to rent a commercial building in the Varsity Shopping Center west of campus, which is home to Bookman’s, Hastings and Michael’s.

On Dec. 1, Flagstaff’s Planning and Zoning Committee met in city hall to discuss and vote on several proposals, including one from NAU to place a new athletic training facility off campus.

Neil Gullickson, an urban planner for the city, gave his staff’s report on NAU’s proposal to the committee. Gullickson said the new facility would be close to campus.

“As the introduction noted, NAU is looking to locate a training facility — 4,100 sq. ft. — in the Hastings-Bookman’s shopping center,” Gullickson said.

Gullickson said the short-term rental of the space did not necessitate changing the zoning designation from a commercial to a public lands, open space and building (PLO) zone.

“The university is typically looked at as an entity unto itself,” Gullickson said. “Their moving off-site was an interesting thing to look at for [my] staff. If the university was moving and owned this property, I think we’d be recommending a re-zoning to the PLO zone — which is what the current university is. In this case, the university is proposing to be located in this site for a temporary period of time.”

In case the university faces a situation in which the Skydome construction takes longer than expected, Gullickson said his planning staff and NAU would like a lease for a few months longer than the projected completion of the stadium.

“The renovations are going on in the [Skydome], and the weight training facility is located in the Dome,” Gullickson said. “This facility is specifically for their athletes. The university has anticipated that the renovations to the Dome will take about nine months. Staff, as part of the conditional use permit, is supportive of this as a temporary use, but has asked the commission to a period of 14 months — the additional five months is asked for in anticipation of any number of things that could push the progress of the Dome back a couple of months.”

In his brief presentation to the committee, Jennus Burton, vice president of Finance and Administration for NAU, said the university has no plans to stay beyond the day the Skydome is finished with its retrofitting.

“Once the renovation is done in the Skydome, we’ll actually pack all of that equipment back up, relocate it back into the Skydome and then cancel our lease on the space,” Burton said. “We need this as basic transition space while construction is under way.”

Despite the passing nature of their stay, Gullickson said there would be many changes to the interior of the rental space to make it ready to hold almost 50 student athletes at a time.

“Improvements are all internal — no external improvements are proposed,” Gullickson said. “We understand that it will include weight-training machines, free weights, ice baths and floor area. We anticipate that up to 46 people will be using this at any one time — that includes athletes and trainers.”

One major concern of the committee was the traffic to be generated by NAU’s latest property acquisition, both in cars on the road and in the parking lots. Gullickson said his staff has found no reason to anticipate large amounts of traffic because of the move, and he thinks most students looking to use the facility will simply walk or ride a bike.

“We do not anticipate that traffic generated by this use will be substantial, and that a fair share of it will be bicycle and pedestrian traffic from the university,” Gullickson said. “There is direct access from the university to the back side of this shopping center — actually, in the back corner where this site is located.”

Burton said NAU will work with the shopping center to make sure students do not abuse parking privileges.

“In regards to the parking issue, students are going to be instructed to park there when they do their workouts and to leave when they are finished,” Burton said. “If they do not, their vehicle is at risk of being towed.”

The committee unanimously voted to approve the lease, adding a condition that a gate between the university and the shopping center be left unlocked for pedestrians to use.

This is the second prominent lease NAU has signed this year; the university is also renting the now-closed South Beaver Elementary School from the Flagstaff Unified School District for a similar purpose: temporary space while the other major campus project of spring 2011, the Liberal Arts building renovations, gets under way.